What's Up With the Poetry?

You've probably noticed that I've posted some poems lately, and may be wondering what's up.

While working through the book, The Rest of God: Restoring Your Soul by Restoring Sabbath by Mark Buchanan, he suggests writing poetry as a discipline to help actually see what's around you every day -- as a way to pay attention. One is required to carefully observe and pay attention in order to describe. It causes you to focus on other things, other people, instead of yourself. And it leads to thinking about what you've seen as you write and describe it. So I decided to try it, because I often find myself going through the motions as I follow my agenda, and miss much of what is going on around me.

It's interesting what happens when you give yourself permission to be open to seeing things that you might describe through poetry. YOU SEE THINGS YOU OTHERWISE WOULDN'T SEE! Try it.

As an adjunct to working on paying attention through poetry, I've started a moblog -- a photo blog where the posts are done from my cell phone -- called Way Finding. Sort of the same idea -- be aware of things I am seeing and snapping a photo with my cell phone, as a way of noticing God and His work in every day things. It helps me pay attention to things I wouldn't otherwise notice. If you'd like to know more about moblogging and/or set up one for yourself, let me know.

And I highly recommend Buchanan's book. In a culture that worships being busy, a fresh look at Sabbath and rest can be life-changing.